


I Just Can't Handle It

by dedicatedfollower467



Series: Whatever This World Can Give to Me [2]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Canon Compliant, Epiphanies, Falling In Love, Inner Dialogue, M/M, Missing Scene, Pining, Podfic Available, Unrequited Love, well not so much missing as just adding inner monologue to a scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-09
Updated: 2019-06-09
Packaged: 2020-04-23 17:04:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19155304
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dedicatedfollower467/pseuds/dedicatedfollower467
Summary: In a bar in Rome, Crowley realizes he is in love with Aziraphale. Except, demons aren't supposed to becapableof love, and if Down There gets wind of this...





	I Just Can't Handle It

**Author's Note:**

> Yes the title is from "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" no I'm not sorry about it.
> 
> First in a series of fics centering on some slowburn Ineffable Husbands, because 6000 years of Mutual Unrequited Love is my JAM. Or at least the first one I've written so far. I might end up writing other stuff that comes chronologically earlier later on, depending on what I come up with. It's all going to be short little mostly stand-alone snippets that can come together for one big story.
> 
> Mostly show canon, with a few references to the book thrown in here and there.

“I’ve never eaten an oyster,” Crowley says, marveling a bit at the fact that the angel _has_ , apparently enough to be interested in some new restaurant that’s prepared them in some new way. That’s an unusually human thing for an angel to do, since strictly speaking they don’t actually need to eat. It sounds almost suspiciously like a sin of the flesh, which an angel shouldn’t even be capable of.

Oh, Crowley’s had his own share of sins of the flesh, but he’s a demon, and that’s _allowed._ Alcohol had been the first vice he’d discovered and positively fallen in love with, but he’d dabbled here and there with other sensual delights. He liked sleeping (he’d bought a little place in Greece a few centuries back for the express purpose of sleeping in it, and hadn’t had the heart to sell it yet) but he’d never really done much eating. Foreign objects going into his body, in any capacity, was usually something Crowley tried to avoid.

But Aziraphale’s face has a kind of astonished delight on it, as though he is so eager to share this earthly pleasure that he can’t possibly wait. “Oh! Oh, well, let me _tempt_ you to-”

Crowley turns to face him, amused, and thinks to himself, _Damn, I love this ridiculous nerd._

He replays the thought in his head, and Aziraphale stumbles over another awkward sentence, but Crowley isn’t really listening anymore.

 _Fuck._ He _loves_ Aziraphale.

That isn’t supposed to happen. Crowley is a demon, he shouldn’t be capable of loving anyone, let alone an angel, of all creatures. Demons don’t love things, they don’t love people, and they definitely don’t love holy beings expressly made to be the divine messengers of God - because demons don’t love what they _used_ to be.

But the longing which throbs somewhere deep in his being, the intense desire to just wrap himself up in Aziraphale’s angelic presence and never leave him, isn’t mere familiarity or even affection, though those are common feelings he has around the angel as well. Hell, it isn’t even _lust_ , which would have been perfectly acceptable.

Which isn’t to say Aziraphale isn’t attractive - Crowley came to terms with the fact that he finds Aziraphale annoyingly hot a long, long time ago. He’s known he harbors a secret desire to jump Aziraphale’s bones ever since that incident in Gomorrah back in 2098, at that tavern that made those wonderful little fermented date-palm cocktails. Aziraphale had worn his tunic girded up around his loins, and Crowley had gotten so distracted by the sight of Aziraphale’s thick, fuzz-covered thighs he’d walked straight into a doorpost and given himself a black eye. That’s when he’d finally admitted it to himself, at least.

(And if he’s going to go around admitting things, he might as well be honest about the fact that he’s _liked_ Aziraphale, as a person, since that very first conversation in the Garden of Eden. But he’s a demon, and lying comes to him more naturally than breathing, even when the only person he’s lying to is himself.)

No, this feeling he’s got right now isn’t his unacted-upon lust for Aziraphale. If it was lust, he’d be fine, because the cardinal sins are _allowed_ to demons, however soft and fleshy they might be. This feeling is something unique, something he’s never felt about anything or anyone else in this entire world, although he thinks that maybe he might have felt something almost, but not quite, like it in Heaven.

And, he realizes, with mounting terror, this isn’t the first time he’s felt it. This is just the first time he’s realized what, exactly, it is.

He’s not supposed to love Aziraphale.

He _can’t_ love Aziraphale. And yet somehow, he has, for quite probably a very long time.

Panic is now rising in his chest, heart pounding, breath starting to come short. If Down There gets a _hint_ of suspicion that Crowley feels this way towards his greatest Adversary, there will be, quite literally, _Hell_ to pay. And Go- Sa- _Someone_ only knows how long he’s been this stupid over his angel, he must have given them so much fodder for it.

At this point, Crowley’s silence has gone on far too long, and something of his fear must have started showing on his face, because Aziraphale deflates like a punctured balloon. The angel’s disappointment is palpable, and it feels like knives digging into Crowley’s chest.

“I’m sorry,” Aziraphale says, frowning down at his cup instead of smiling at Crowley. “You must be terribly busy. I shouldn’t have bothered you.”

Part of Crowley, the part that is still silly with his love for Aziraphale, wants to say, _Oh no, not busy at all. Quick temptation, over and done with already. Got a bit of free time, might as well come with you. See what the fuss is about. Oysters, eh?_

The part of Crowley that is frightened out of its wits right now, that is thinking of all the tortures Hell might inflict upon him, says, “Right, yeah. Got to be going. Lots to do. People to tempt, vices to encourage, that sort of thing.”

Crowley throws back the rest of his drink in a single gulp that burns like _anything_ on the way down, stands, and heads towards the nearest exit. He tries not to glance back as he goes, but unfortunately he can just see Aziraphale out of the corner of his eye, staring morosely down into his drink.

He _can’t_ just leave him like that.

“Aziraphale,” Crowley says, pausing at the edge of the doorway.

Aziraphale looks up, and Crowley would swear he has never seen eyes so clouded with dejection in his entire existence.

Crowley swallows. “I’m too busy just now,” he says, “But - some other time, perhaps?”

Seeing the joy suffusing Aziraphale’s face feels like his first sunrise in Eden, filling Crowley with a deep and comforting warmth that spreads through his whole body.

“I’d very much like that,” says Aziraphale.

“Yeah,” Crowley says, his tongue too big for his mouth. “I’ll see you around, angel.”

And then he has to leave and find a place to hyperventilate in peace.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I _am_ willing to take fic requests and prompts for this 'verse, so feel free to leave a comment with something! I won't guarantee I'll write it, but I'll at least look at it!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] I Just Can't Handle It](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19191778) by [defpodfics (dedicatedfollower467)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dedicatedfollower467/pseuds/defpodfics)




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